Category: Family

Recently the news media has been abuzz with stories about the Black Lives Matter movement and its possible connection to the recent trend of murdered police officers. And right smack in the middle of the media discussions have been several members of our Project 21 black leadership network.

This past Friday, September 4, the Fox News Channel’s “Kelly File” held a discussion entitled “Black Lives Matter and 2016.” Project 21 members Stacy Washington and Bishop Council Nedd II were part of the lively discussion. For the full story, click here.

I just returned home from running errands in a nearby town. Traffic was slow because of the remnants on a car accident. I glanced over to see what had happened and it was clear that the passenger in the car was not wearing his seatbelt and went partially through the windshield.

Three years ago this month my seatbelt saved my life when, while avoiding two deer frolicking in the street around a blind curve, I swerved and flipped over my very cool convertible…

…I’m happy to talk about that car another time… Moving on.

I posted the above picture on my facebook page and my Emirati friends we amazed when I told them that I walked away from that accident. Befuddled, they were surprised and asked how. I simply told them that I was wearing my seat belt.

So many lives can be saved, and so many injuries prevented by just wearing your seat belt. Have a safe weekend.

The legislation, which would ban federal grants and Medicaid reimbursement payments to Planned Parenthood, but keep overall funding levels for womens’ health care services the same, will be voted upon in the U.S. Senate at approximately 5:30 PM on Monday, August 3.(1)

Project 21 members say:

* Dr. Day Gardner: It is mind-boggling that American taxpayers are forced to pay more than $500 million to Planned Parenthood

“Planned Parenthood is a billion-dollar-a-year organization that makes most of its blood money by killing children by way of abortion. It is mind-boggling that American taxpayers are ‘forced’ to pay more than $500 million to an organization that kills unborn children in the most gruesome and brutal ways possible, and then deals in selling their lungs, heart and liver and other body parts for profit.

“What does Planned Parenthood do with the money? There is the obvious, of course: Planned Parenthood’s CEO makes more than half a million dollars a year. They also pay high salaries to abortionists who fly from abortion mill to abortion mill, killing children.

“You may have heard that Planned Parenthood does ‘cancer screenings.’
What that means is the same type of breast exam that every woman can do herself at home. They do not do mammograms.

“They also say their funding provides for contraception, treatment and tests for sexually transmitted diseases, and other women’s health services. First of all, what are ‘other women’s health services’? Secondly, aren’t all those things supposed to be covered by ObamaCare?” – Dr. Day Gardner, Project 21 member, president of the National Black Pro-Life Union and an executive member of the Washington, D.C.-based National Clergy Council.

* Joe R. Hicks: Why is this heinous organization still being subsidized by federal tax dollars?

“Only heartless or hopelessly ideologically-blinded leftist political partisans were unaffected by the horrific video clips of Planned Parenthood operatives coldly discussing the lurid details of dismembered aborted babies. However, the question must now be – why is this heinous organization still being subsidized by federal tax dollars? Planned Parenthood, a billion-dollar so-called ‘non-profit,’ performs 300,000 abortions each and every week, yet describes itself as a ‘women’s health care group.’ Are they really? They claim to provide valuable health services, like mammograms, yet is has been discovered that they do no such thing. They ‘refer’ women to health clinics that do provide this service. Planned Parenthood argues that ‘research,’ performed on crushed and dismembered aborted babies, has advanced stem cell cures, yet cannot provide independent data to show this is the case. What’s clear is that they perform abortions, subsidized by tax dollars. Congress must act now.” – Mr. Joe R. Hicks, Project 21 member and vice president of Community Advocates, Inc. in Los Angeles.

* Bishop Council Nedd: If there’s a constitutional right to a lifestyle, why isn’t there a constitutional right to life?

“Last week, a friend of mine who is a bishop and constitutional lawyer, remarked, ‘If there’s a constitutional right to a lifestyle, why isn’t there a constitutional right to life?’ So, the question in my mind is, why are the taxpayers subsidizing the murder of innocents in violation of the Sixth Amendment to the Constitution?

“Planned Parenthood received $500 million in taxpayer dollars last year. If we are now so enlightened that the courts are now signing off on protecting lifestyles, protecting lives would theoretically give the courts more lifestyles to protect. However, it is sadly still the case that the lives that the courts are abandoning to the social engineering of the elite and enlightened are the least of those among us. To protect the most vulnerable, Congress should pass a law that bars Medicaid from reimbursing its clinics for patient visits.” – Bishop Council Nedd II, founding member of Project 21, rector of St. Alban’s Anglican Church in Pine Grove Mills, PA and author of the books Does America Hate God? Faith Under Fire (2015) and The Final Four: A Scriptural Journey Through Advent (2013).

“The defense of Planned Parenthood by the media and politicians is disheartening. New videos released this week by the Center for Medical Progress provide evidence that doctors and executives working for Planned Parenthood may have committed gruesome crimes that make Dr. Gosnell’s clinic of horrors look tame. Each new video reveals more damning information including video of the Chief Medical Director of the Rocky Mountain Planned Parenthood negotiating for the sale of baby body parts. This comes right on the heels of news that the Alliance Defense Fund has filed a criminal complaint after learning that a 13-year-old girl was brought in for an abortion by her rapist/sexual predator and Rocky Mountain Planned Parenthood performed the abortion but didn’t report the abuse. Criminal. $528 million dollars of taxpayer funds are sent to Planned Parenthood on a yearly basis. Another $612 million dollars of taxpayer funds earmarked for ‘reproductive health services’ go to USAID for abortions abroad.

“Americans have had enough of the excuses and whitewashing of what increasingly looks like an organized crime syndicate hell-bent on selling human baby parts for cash.

“There are 666 Planned Parenthoods in operation, with some states only having only one. In contrast there are 9,069 federally funded Community Health Centers that provide identical services excepting abortion operating in all 50 states. Women don’t need Planned Parenthood; it does not deserve federal funding.” – Mrs. Stacy Washington, Project 21 member and radio talk show host on KFTK in St. Louis.

Project 21, a leading voice of black conservatives for over two decades, is sponsored by the National Center for Public Policy Research. The National Center for Public Policy Research, founded in 1982, is a non-partisan, free-market, independent conservative think-tank.

Members of Black Leadership Group Say U.S. District Court Judge Was Wrong to Release Transcript of Deposition in a Cosby Civil Case Explicitly Because Cosby Gave a 2005 Speech in Telling Young Black Parents to do a Better Job Raising Their Children

WASHINGTON, DC — Members of the Project 21 black conservative leadership network are weighing in following news that documents in a civil case related to allegations that Bill Cosby molested a Temple University employee were made public by a U.S. district court judge specifically because Dr. Cosby has publicly criticized the way many black parents rear their children.

“I’m talking about these people who cry when their son is standing there in an orange suit. Where were you when he was two?” Cosby famously said in 2005 in what has become known as the “Pound Cake” speech. “Where were you when he was twelve? Where were you when he was eighteen, and how come you don’t know he had a pistol? And where is his father, and why don’t you know where he is? And why doesn’t the father show up to talk to this boy?”

“50 percent drop out rate, I’m telling you, and people in jail, and women having children by five, six different men,” Cosby continued in 2005. “Under what excuse, I want somebody to love me, and as soon as you have it, you forget to parent. Grandmother, mother, and great grandmother in the same room, raising children, and the child knows nothing about love or respect of any one of the three of them. All this child knows is ‘gimme, gimme, gimme.’ These people want to buy the friendship of a child… and the child couldn’t care less. Those of us sitting out here who have gone on to some college or whatever we’ve done, we still fear our parents. And these people are not parenting. They’re buying things for the kid. $500 sneakers, for what? They won’t buy or spend $250 on Hooked on Phonics.”

Project 21 members say the law should not treat Cosby differently because he gave that speech.

“Bill Cosby should be vilified and, if possible, prosecuted if he used Quaaludes and perhaps other drugs to facilitate rape,” said Project 21 member Deroy Murdock, a New York-based columnist. “His decades-long reputation as a popular entertainer should not shield him from the consequences of his actions.”

“But Cosby’s role as a ‘public moralist’ with views on ‘childrearing, family life, education, and crime,’ as U.S. District Judge Eduardo C. Robreno described him, should have played no role in Robreno’s recent decision to publicize Cosby’s deposition in an alleged sexual-molestation case,” Murdock added. “This transcript should have stayed sealed or been unsealed solely for legal reasons, not due to Cosby’s beliefs about any issue beyond this case. Americans should be free to express themselves without fearing that their views will be used later to justify breaching confidential documents in what resembles political score settling by federal judges.”

“This ruling is appalling,” said Horace Cooper, an attorney, former counsel to a U.S. House of Representatives Majority Leader, and co-chairman of Project 21. “A decision to unseal documents is a weighty one and should only occur under exceptional circumstances – circumstances that have nothing to do with the popularity (or lack thereof) of one of the litigating parties.”

“My father was born in to a very different world than the one I live in today. He was a black Roman Catholic who was born in 1925 in Sumter, SC. He also spent 20 years as a policeman. As a youth he repeatedly saw the rights and privileges of individuals blatantly and furtively ignored. One of the lessons he drummed into me and my brothers was the importance of knowing the law and the rules so than no one can take advantage of you,” said the Most Rev. Council Nedd II, PhD, DHum, Bishop and Rector, St. Alban’s Anglican Church, Pine Grove Mills, PA.

“What we have seen over the last year is Bill Cosby repeatedly attacked and tried in the media. Without commenting on the allegations against Dr. Cosby, or the credibility of the accusers, based on the fact that none of the accusers, seen on the variety of news and talk shows, saw fit to push for criminal charges when the events occurred, tells me that they made a personal and calculated decision to live with whatever transpired. To me it seems opportunistic to seek media headlines now.”

“What the judge did in this case is as morally reprehensible as SCOTUS deciding to ignore the constitution on the gay marriage issue. The judge releasing those sealed documents is pandering to the media, akin to Justice Robert’s decision in the Obamacare ruling, and Charleston County Magistrate James Gosnell, Jr.’s very odd speech at the arraignment of Dylann Roof,” Bishop Nedd added.

Project 21, a leading voice of black conservatives for over two decades, is sponsored by the National Center for Public Policy Research (http://www.nationalcenter.org).

I’ve had several unfortunate opportunities to observe the consequences of single mothers raising male children without the influence of positive male role models.

Many boys who are raised by single moms can acquire the skills and maturity to lead healthy, full and productive lives. But they seem to be the exception rather than the rule. There are too many boys these days who are either feminized or reliant on false bravado.

My criticism is not to find blame with single mothers. They often do the best they can with limited resources. But I do believe many single mothers need to rethink their parenting philosophy.

My first substantial exposure to significant numbers of boys from families without fathers was while teaching at a public charter high school in Washington, DC.

It was easy to see basic problems, such as when boys earnestly asked me to teach them the proper way to shave, tie a tie and help them pick out clothing for job interviews. More disturbing was a 17-year-old boy who asked me to help him put in his earrings. It’s funny that he needed another man to help him put on his jewelry. It’s difficult to be gangsta when you ask another man to help put in your earrings.

I now live in an small town in rural Pennsylvania, where the problem changes from black to white. I routinely see young men calling girls the “b-word,” without realizing such crude remarks are the hyperbole and satire of old television reruns. With households devoid of encouraging male role models, they seem to have no other choice but to mimic what they see on television and from their peers.

The absence of fathers in both places leads to an exponential increase in “momma’s boys.” This occurs because a mother’s instinct to overlook a child’s character flaws goes unchecked. She instinctively defends that child’s bad behavior, and seldom wants to take corrective action.

The pampered momma’s boy often has few or no responsibilities around the home. His mother buys his clothes, cooks his meals, does his laundry and financially underwrites and countenances bad habits. She comes to his rescue, fights his battles, speaks up for him and even speaks for him. She blames others and protects her boy from harm, despite the fact he is old enough to be responsible for his own behavior.

These mothers need to cut the umbilical cord, and — to paraphrase Scripture — they should be dining on meat and not milk because they leave their boys unprepared for real life.

From my own experience, these unchecked household problems can have deadly consequences. Of the approximately 150 boys I taught over a two-year period in D.C., I know of 17 who have already died by gun violence.

From personal conversations and Facebook postings, I see that few of my former students sought education past high school. Of those who did, many never finished college but are saddled with the tuition loans. They lack careers and rely on hourly wages and few (if any) benefits. Many are involved in the underground economy of the inner city.

In rural Pennsylvania, the situation is remarkably similar. Many boys who grow up without fathers aspire to work in the coal mine because their friends work there. Some are involved in a booming underground economy where the drugs of choice are crystal meth and heroin. Unmarried girls push baby strollers. Young men spend too much money on pick-up trucks.

The common ground between these two seemingly very different groups of young men is that they are still living with their mothers. They dare not venture too far from the person who has always provided for them.

Single mothers must ensure their boys have positive male role models in their lives. This may take some effort, but the reward is worth it.

Published by the National Center for Public Policy Research. Reprints permitted provided source is credited. New Visions Commentaries reflect the views of their author, and not necessarily those of Project 21, other Project 21 members, or the National Center for Public Policy Research, its board or staff.